This photo was taken on St. Simons Island by my friend Bill Bagwell. That's still my favorite hat!
I don't like to give advice. Well, that's not completely true. I don't like to give advice in writing because if I change my mind later, there is hard evidence to remind me of whatever I said back then that turned out to the be worst advice ever. So this is not advice. This is just a place to share a few things that have helped me think more clearly and feel more deeply and stop worrying so much. I pass them on in the hope they might do the same for you.

The Miracle of Mindfulness: A Manual on Meditation
by Thich Nhat Hanh
The author is a poet, Zen Master, activist, and was Chair of the Vietnamese Buddhist Peace Delegation during the Vietnam War. He was nominated by Dr. MartinLuther King, Jr., for the Nobel Peace Prize. This is a book for people who think they can't meditate.

365 Tao: Daily Meditations
by Deng Ming-Dao
A friend of mine gave me this book just before my first national book tour. I remember reading it while I waited for my train in Philadelphia's 30th Street Station and thinking I never would have survived those hectic three weeks without it.

We Are the Ones We Have Been Waiting For, by Alice Walker
This book of meditations, speeches and letters always renews my commitment to being an active and informed citizen of the world and child of the cosmos.



Gift from the Sea, by Anne Morrow Lindbergh
Thoughts on love, work, youth, age and the absolute necessity of solitude. A little book with a lot to say.


The Big Sea, by Langston Hughes.
The first volume of his autobiography and probably the book I would take to that desert island if I could only pick one. My mother used to read chapters of this to my sister and me like fairy tales.